Alabama

Mobile Association for Blind helps clients find work

Mobile Association for the Blind client Kathy Magee reads the large print on her computer. (Press Register/Victor Calhoun)

MOBILE, Alabama -- Sidney Beard owned a catering business and was a chef at Heron Lakes Country Club in Mobile when his diabetes caused him to go blind.

Out of work for almost two years, Beard recently became one of the first employees at the Mobile Association for the Blind's new Contact Center, located in the association's building on Gordon Smith Drive, where clients are being trained and put back to work.

At the Contact Center, visually impaired and blind clients are conducting telephone surveys and polls for businesses and agencies.

"The main focus is putting people to work that are having problems getting a job," said Cliff Barros, executive director of the association.

"We can help companies with their telephone needs and in anything other than sales," said Barros.

"We're not selling anything," said Tim Creamer, a spokesman for the association, who stresses that the blind and visually impaired workers are not telemarketers.

Instead, the employees are learning how to conduct surveys and polls, according to Creamer. He said the association would soon be partnering with the Mobile County Emergency Management Agency to make calls to residents alerting them before hurricanes and tropical storms.

Barros said the unemployment rate for people with disabilities is 75 percent.

"People just need to understand the technology is there to become employable," said Barros.

In one day, clients made 441 service calls to people for a company called Pay Day Loan, according to Creamer. He said the calls were made to people who had either signed up for Pay Day loans or had applied for some type of loan. If the people were interested in the service, the clients then transferred them to one of the company's debt specialists.

The Contact Center is operating on a grant from the Alabama Department of Rehabilitation Services, according to Barros. Currently there are four clients who are working in the center, but that will change, said Barros. "We should be up to 15 people quickly," he said.

Sitting at a computer with headphones on, Beard made a call.

Feeling computer keys that are marked especially for Beard, the computer cursor moved to the name and address of the person he was calling. Once Beard touched the key a voice read aloud the person's name and address.

"I'm able to help people and that means a lot to me," said Beard.

"It enables me to get out and to work," said Beard, adding "I've worked all of my life."

Barros said the new computer equipment is "putting people back to work who were having problems getting a job."

Across the room Kathy Magee relies on screen enhancing software that magnifies on the screen so she can read the words.

Magee, diagnosed with macular degeneration, said this is her first job since being laid off three years ago. Macular degeneration is a progressive deterioration of a region of the retina called the macula.

"This is like starting all over again," said Magee, who moved to Mobile from Biloxi after Hurricane Katrina destroyed her home.